


to a child

by OverlyCheerfulRat



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Mental Breakdown, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2020-11-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:20:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27687497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OverlyCheerfulRat/pseuds/OverlyCheerfulRat
Summary: Itachi is only seven years old.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 23





	to a child

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ratgrandpa2000](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ratgrandpa2000/gifts).



> kinda unrealistic that these kids were like "crippling ptsd? nahhhh fam i'm gucci"

Itachi is four years old when he kills a man for the first time. When he returns to his home, he lies awake, wrapped in blankets, and is almost asleep when he hears Mikoto yelling at Fugaku. He slips out of bed and to the doorway, listening silently.

“-a fucking baby, you idiot, what were you thinking?!” Her voice is hoarse, panicked in a way he’s never heard before, and he wants to run to her, but he knows he shouldn’t be awake at this hour.

“We’re at war. He’ll have to know sooner or later,” Fugaku says, and his his voice is shaking. Itachi has never heard his father sound unsteady before. 

“You took my baby to a battlefield. Are you insane? Are you fucking insane? He could have died, what if he’d died?! Can you just put yourself in my shoes for a minute and imagine- if you came home without my son? You can’t-”

“He can’t be a child forever,” Fugaku interrupts. “I was always taught that if you can hold a knife, you’re old enough to-”

“He is four years old! He’s not-!”

The argument continues, but Itachi goes back to bed, putting a pillow over his ears. Fugaku will win, he always does, and in the morning Itachi will wake up with the moans of dying men in his ears and phantom blood under his nails, and he will not run to his mother’s arms. 

When he graduates the academy, Itachi is seven years old, and the youngest member of his team. His teachers say he’s a genius, a prodigy, tell him his parents must be so proud. His new teammates look on with poorly concealed jealousy when he outshines them in training. He walks past the playground on his way home every day and stops to watch the civilian children, wishing he could go talk to them, but how? He’s practiced smiling in the mirror, but his eyes are dead. Itachi knows how he comes off- quiet, creepy, strange. They don’t want him there.

Tenma dies in front of him, dies protecting him. His blood soaks the ground, surrounds his head like a halo, and when Itachi is taken home by an ANBU officer he wonders what the point of his being there was. What’s the point of being a prodigy if all he can do is watch his teammates die? He doesn’t speak to his parents when he goes home.

The next morning, Mikoto wakes him up with a concerned expression, putting her hand to his forehead. The sheets are wet, he realizes, and shame blossoms in his chest, and suddenly everything is too much. Itachi bursts into tears and doesn’t stop crying even when Mikoto pulls him into a cautious hug. He clings to her, not caring that it’s weak. He doesn’t want to be strong anymore. Itachi is seven years old, and he wants his mother.

Mikoto can’t pry him off, so she carries him into the bathroom and helps him bathe, something she hasn’t done since he was an infant. She puts him in her bed after, saying he must be sick, and Itachi curls into a ball. Later, she will take him to the doctor, because he will never speak again. Later, she will quietly withdraw him from active shinobi duty, because he can’t hold a kunai without crying. 

People start to talk about Fugaku’s older son, saying he’s broken, and it’s too bad, he had so much potential. When Sasuke starts the academy, his teachers watch him closely, making sure he won’t go crazy like his brother. Itachi stays in the house, never meeting anyone’s eyes, never speaking, but he smiles sometimes. Mikoto teaches him to cook and sew, and he helps her clean.

When Itachi wakes up screaming, his parents argue about what went wrong. Fugaku whispers that they should send him somewhere, that there must be places for broken people, but Mikoto just pets Itachi’s head like he’s a cat, says he’s not hurting anyone.


End file.
